O. Henry

             Blind Man's Holiday


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Alas for the man and for the artist with the shifting
point of perspective!  Life shall be a confusion of ways
to the one; the landscape shall rise up and confound the
other.  Take the case of Lorison.  At one time he
appeared to himself to be the feeblest of fools; at another
he conceived that he followed ideals so fine that the world
was not yet ready to accept them.  During one mood he
cursed his folly; possessed by the other, he bore himself
with a serene grandeur akin to greatness: in neither did
he attain the perspective.

Generations before, the name had been "Larsen."
His race had bequeathed him its fine-strung, melancholy
temperament, its saving balance of thrift and industry.

From his point of perspective he saw himself an outcast
from society, forever to be a shady skulker along the
ragged edge of respectability; a denizen des trois-quartz
de monde, that pathetic spheroid lying between the haut
and the demi, whose inhabitants envy each of their neigh-
bours, and are scorned by both.  He was self-condemned
to this opinion, as he was self-exiled, through it, to this
quaint Southern city a thousand miles from his former
home.  Here he had dwelt for longer than a year, know-
ing but few, keeping in a subjective world of shadows
which was invaded at times by the perplexing bulks of
jarring realities.  Then he fell in love with a girl whom
he met in a cheap restaurant, and his story begins.

The Rue Chartres, in New Orleans, is a street of ghosts.
It lies in the quarter where the Frenchman, in his prime,
set up his translated pride and glory; where, also, the
arrogant don had swaggered, and dreamed of gold and
grants and ladies' gloves.  Every flagstone has its grooves
worn by footsteps going royally to the wooing and the
fighting.  Every house has a princely heartbreak; each
doorway its untold tale of gallant promise and slow decay.

By night the Rue Chartres is now but a murky fissure,
from which the groping wayfarer sees, flung against the
sky, the tangled filigree of Moorish iron balconies.  Ths
old houses of monsieur stand yet, indomitable against the
century, but their essence is gone.  The street is one of
ghosts to whosoever can see them.

A faint heartbeat of the street's ancient glory still sur-
vives in a corner occupied by the Cafй Carabine d'Or.
Once men gathered there to plot against kings, and to
warn presidents.  They do so yet, but they are not the
same kind of men.  A brass button will scatter these;
those would have set their faces against an army.  Above
the door hangs the sign board, upon which has been
depicted a vast animal of unfamiliar species.  In the act
of firing upon this monster is represented an unobtrusive
human levelling an obtrusive gun, once the colour of
bright gold.  Now the legend above the picture is faded
beyond conjecture; the gun's relation to the title is a
matter of faith; the menaced animal, wearied of the long
aim of the hunter, has resolved itself into a shapeless blot.

The place is known as "Antonio's," as the name, white
upon the red-lit transparency, and gilt upon the windows,
attests.  There is a promise in "Antonio"; a justifiable
expectancy of savoury things in oil and pepper and wine,
and perhaps an angel's whisper of garlic.  But the rest
of the name is "O'Riley."  Antonio O'Riley!

The Carabine d'Or is an ignominious ghost of the Rue
Chartres.  The cafй where Bienville and Conti dined,
where a prince has broken bread, is become a "family
ristaurant."

Its customers are working men and women, almost to
a unit.  Occasionally you will see chorus girls from the
cheaper theatres, and men who follow avocations sub-
ject to quick vicissitudes; but at Antonio's -- name rich
in Bohemian promise, but tame in fulfillment -- manners
debonair and gay are toned down to the "family" stand-
ard.  Should you light a cigarette, mine host will touch
you on the "arrum" and remind you that the proprieties
are menaced.  "Antonio" entices and beguiles from fiery
legend without, but "O'Riley" teaches decorum within.

It was at this restaurant that Lorison first saw the girl.
A flashy fellow with a predatory eye had followed her in,
and had advanced to take the other chair at the little table
where she stopped, but Lorison slipped into the seat before
him.  Their acquaintance began, and grew, and how for
two months they had sat at the same table each evening,
not meeting by appointment, but as if by a series of
fortuitous and happy accidents.  After dining, they
would take a walk together in one of the little city parks,
or among the panoramic markets where exhibits a con-
tinuous vaudeville of sights and sounds.  Always at eight
o'clock their steps led them to a certain street corner,
where she prettily but firmly bade him good night and
left him.  "I do not live far from here," she frequently
said, "and you must let me go the rest of the way alone."

But now Lorison had discovered that he wanted to go
the rest of the way with her, or happiness would depart,
leaving, him on a very lonely corner of life.  And at the
same time that he made the discovery, the secret of his
banishment from the society of the good laid its finger
in his face and told him it must not be.

Man is too thoroughly an egoist not to be also an egotist;
if he love, the object shall know it.  During a lifetime he
may conceal it through stress of expediency and honour,
but it shall bubble from his dying lips, though it disrupt
a neighbourhood.  It is known, however, that most men
do not wait so long to disclose their passion.  In the case
of Lorison, his particular ethics positively forbade him
to declare his sentiments, but he must needs dally with
the subject, and woo by innuendo at least.

On this night, after the usual meal at the Carabine
d'Or, he strolled with his companion down the dim old
street toward the river

The Rue Chartres perishes in the old Place d'Armes.
The ancient Cabildo, where Spanish justice fell like hail,
faces it, and the Cathedral, another provincial ghost,
overlooks it.  Its centre is a little, iron-railed park of
flowers and immaculate gravelled walks, where citizens
take the air of evenings.  Pedestalled high above it, the
general sits his cavorting steed, with his face turned
stonily down the river toward English Turn, whence
come no more Britons to bombard his cotton bales.

Often the two sat in this square, but to-night Lorison
guided her past the stone-stepped gate, and still riverward.
As they walked, he smiled to himself to think that all
he knew of her -- except that be loved her -- was her
name, Norah Greenway, and that she lived with her
brother.  They had talked about everything except
themselves.  Perhaps her reticence had been caused by his.

They came, at length, upon the levee, and sat upon a
great, prostrate beam.  The air was pungent with the
dust of commerce.  The great river slipped yellowly
past.  Across it Algiers lay, a longitudinous black bulk
against a vibrant electric haze sprinkled with exact stars.

The girl was young and of the piquant order.  A certain
bright melancholy pervaded her; she possessed an
untarnished, pale prettiness doomed to please.  Her
voice, when she spoke, dwarfed her theme.  It was the
voice capable of investing little subjects with a large
interest.  She sat at ease, bestowing her skirts with the
little womanly touch, serene as if the begrimed pier were
a summer garden.  Lorison poked the rotting boards
with his cane.

He began by telling her that he was in love with some
one to whom he durst not speak of it.  "And why not?"
she asked, accepting swiftly his fatuous presentation of
a third person of straw.  "My place in the world," he
answered, "is none to ask a woman to share.  I am an
outcast from honest people; I am wrongly accused of
one crime, and am, I believe, guilty of another."

Thence he plunged into the story of his abdication from
society.  The story, pruned of his moral philosophy,
deserves no more than the slightest touch.  It is no new
tale, that of the gambler's declension.  During one
night's sitting he lost, and then had imperilled a certain
amount of his employer's money, which, by accident, he
carried with him.  He continued to lose, to the last wager,
and then began to gain, leaving the game winner to a
somewhat formidable sum.  The same night his
employer's safe was robbed.  A search was had; the
winnings of Lorison were found in his room, their total
forming an accusative nearness to the sum purloined.
He was taken, tried and, through incomplete evidence,
released, smutched with the sinister devoirs of a dis-
agreeing jury.

"It is not in the unjust accusation," he said to the girl,
"that my burden lies, but in the knowledge that from the
moment I staked the first dollar of the firm's money I
was a criminal -- no matter whether I lost or won.  You
see why it is impossible for me to speak of love to her."

"It is a sad thing," said Norah, after a little pause.
"to think what very good people there are in the world."

"Good?"  said Lorison.

"I was thinking of this superior person whom you
say you love.  She must be a very poor sort of creature."

"I do not understand."

"Nearly," she continued, "as poor a sort of creature
as yourself."

"You do not understand,"	said Lorison, removing his
hat and sweeping back his fine, light hair.  "Suppose
she loved me in return, and were willing to marry me.
Think, if you can, what would follow.  Never a day
Would pass but she would be reminded of her sacrifice.
I would read a condescension in her smile, a pity even in
her affection, that would madden me.  No.  The thing
would stand between us forever.  Only equals should
mate.  I could never ask her to come down upon my
lower plane."

An arc light faintly shone upon Lorison's face.  An
illumination from within also pervaded it.  The girl
saw the rapt, ascetic look; it was the face either of Sir
Galahad or Sir Fool.

"Quite starlike," she said, "is this unapproachable
angel.  Really too high to be grasped."

"By me, yes."

She faced him suddenly.  "My dear friend, would you
prefer your star fallen?"  Lorison made a wide gesture.

"You push me to the bald fact," he declared; "you
are not in sympathy with my argument.  But I will
answer you so.  If I could reach my particular star, to
drag it down, I would not do it; but if it were fallen, I
would pick it up, and thank Heaven for the privilege."

They were silent for some minutes.  Norah shivered,
and thrust her hands deep into the pockets of her jacket.
Lorison uttered a remorseful exclamation.

"I'm not cold," she said.  "I was just thinking.  I
ought to tell you something.  You have selected a strange
confidante.  But you cannot expect a chance acquain-
ance, picked up in a doubtful restaurant, to be an angel."

"Norah!"  cried Lorison.

"Let me go on.  You have told me about yourself.
We have been such good friends.  I must tell you now
what I never wanted you to know.  I am -- worse than
you are.  I was on the stage . . . I sang in the
chorus . . . I was pretty bad, I guess . . . I
stole diamonds	from the prima donna	. . . they
arrested me	. . . I gave most of them up, and they
let me go . .	. I drank wine every night	. . . a
great deal . . . I was very wicked, but -- "

Lorison knelt quickly by her side and took her
hands.

"Dear Norah!"  he said, exultantly.  "It is you, it is
you I love!  You never guessed it, did you?  'Tis you
I meant all the time.  Now I can speak.  Let me make
you forget the past.  We have both suffered; let us shut
out the world, and live for each other.  Norah, do you
hear me say I love you?"

"In spite of -- "

"Rather say because of it.  You have come out of
your past noble and good.  Your heart is an angel's,
Give it to me."

"A little while ago you feared the future too much to
even speak."

"But for you; not for myself.  Can you love me?"

She cast herself, wildly sobbing, upon his breast.

"Better than life -- than truth itself -- than every-
thing."

"And my own past," said Lorison, with a note of
solicitude -- "can you forgive and -- "

"I answered you that," she whispered, "when I told
you I loved you."  She leaned away, and looked thought-
fully at him.  "If I had not told you about myself, would
you have -- would you -- "

"No," he interrupted; "I would never have let you
know I loved you.  I would never have asked you this
-- Norah, will you be my wife?"

She wept again.

"Oh, believe me; I am good now -- I am no longer
wicked!  I will be the best wife in the world.  Don't
think I am -- bad any more.  If you do I shall die, I
shall die!"

While he was consoling, her, she brightened up, eager
and impetuous.  "Will vou marry me to-night?"  she
said.  "Will you prove it that way.  I have a reason for
wishing it to be to-night.  Will you?"

Of one of two things was this exceeding frankness the
outcome: either of importunate brazenness or of utter
innocence.  The lover's perspective contained only the
one.

"The sooner," said Lorison, "the happier I shall be."

"What is there to do?"  she asked.  "What do you
have to get?  Come!  You should know."

Her energy stirred the dreamer to action.

"A city directory first," he cried, gayly, "to find where
the man lives who gives licenses to happiness.  We will
go together and rout him out.  Cabs, cars, policemen,
telephones and ministers shall aid us."

"Father Rogan shall marry us," said the girl, with
ardour.  "I will take you to him."

An hour later the two stood at the open doorway of an
immense, gloomy brick building in a narrow and lonely
street.  The license was tight in Norah's hand.

"Wait here a moment," she said, "till I find Father
Rogan."

She plunged into the black hallway, and the lover was
left standing, as it were, on one leg, outside.  His impa-
tience was not greatly taxed.  Gazing curiously into
what seemed the hallway to Erebus, he was presently
reassured by a stream of light that bisected the darkness,
far down the passage.  Then he heard her call, and
fluttered lampward, like the moth.  She beckoned him
through a doorway into the room whence emanated the
light.  The room was bare of nearly everything except
books, which had subjugated all its space.  Here and
there little spots of territory had been reconquered.  An
elderly, bald man, with a superlatively calm, remote eye,
stood by a table with a book in his hand, his finger still
marking a page.  His dress was sombre and appertained
to a religious order.  His eye denoted an acquaintance
with the perspective.

"Father Rogan," said Norah, "this is he."

"The two of ye," said Father Rogan, "want to get
married?"

They did not deny it.  He married them.  The cere-
mony was quickly done.  One who could have witnessed
it, and felt its scope, might have trembled at the terrible
inadequacy of it to rise to the dignity of its endless chain
of results.

Afterward the priest spake briefly, as if by rote, of
certain other civil and legal addenda that either might or
should, at a later time, cap the ceremony.  Lorison
tendered a fee, which was declined, and before the door
closed after the departing couple Father Rogan's book
popped open again where his finger marked it.

In the dark hall Norah whirled and clung to her com-
panion, tearful.

"Will you never, never be sorry?"

At last she was reassured.

At the first light they reached upon the street, she asked
the time, just as she had each night.  Lorison looked at
his watch.  Half-past eight.

Lorison thought it was from habit that she guided their
steps toward the corner where they always parted.  But,
arrived there, she hesitated, and then released his arm.
A drug store stood on the corner; its bright, soft light
shone upon them.

"Please leave me here as usual to-night," said Norah,
sweetly.  "I must -- I would rather you would.  You
will not object?  At six to-morrow evening I will meet
you at Antonio's.  I want to sit with vou there once more.
And then -- I will go where you say."  She gave him a
bewildering, bright smile, and walked swiftly away.

Surely it needed all the strength of her charm to carry
off this astounding behaviour.  It was no discredit to
Lorison's strength of mind that his head began to whirl.
Pocketing his hands, he rambled vacuously over to the
druggist's windows, and began assiduously to spell over
the names of the patent medicines therein displayed.

As soon as be had recovered his wits, he proceeded
along the street in an aimless fashion.  After drifting for
two or three squares, he flowed into a somewhat more
pretentious thoroughfare, a way much frequented by him
in his solitary ramblings.  For here was a row of slops
devoted to traffic in goods of the widest range of choice --
handiworks of art, skill and fancy, products of nature
and labour from every zone.

Here, for a time, he loitered among the conspicuous
windows, where was set, emphasized bv congested floods
of light, the cunningest spoil of the interiors.  There
were few passers, and of this Lorison was glad.  He was
not of the world.  For a long time he had touched his
fellow man only at the gear of a levelled cog-wheel -- at
right angles, and upon a different axis.  He had dropped
into a distinctly new orbit.  The stroke of ill fortune had
acted upon him, in effect, as a blow delivered upon the
apex of a certain ingenious toy, the musical top, which-
when thus buffeted while spinning, gives forth, with
scarcely retarded motion, a complete change of key and
chord.

Strolling along the pacific avenue, he experienced
singular, supernatural calm, accompanied by an unusual a
activity of brain.  Reflecting upon recent affairs, be
assured himself of his happiness in having won for a bride
the one he had so greatly desired, yet he wondered mildly
at his dearth of active emotion.  Her strange behaviour
in abandoning him without valid excuse on his bridal eve
aroused in him only a vague and curious speculation.
Again, he found himself contemplating, with complaisant
serenity, the incidents of her somewhat lively career.  His
perspective seemed to have been queerly shifted.

As he stood before a window near a corner, his ears
were assailed by a waxing clamour and commotion.  He
stood close to the window to allow passage to the cause
of the hubbub -- a procession of human beings, which
rounded the corner aid headed in his direction.  He 
perceived a salient hue of blue and a glitter of brass about
a central figure of dazzling white and silver, and a ragged
wake of black, bobbing figures.

Two ponderous policemen Were conducting between
them a woman dressed as if for the stage, in a short, white,
satiny skirt reaching to the knees, pink stockings, and a
sort of sleeveless bodice bright with relucent, armour-like
scales.  Upon her curly, light hair was perched, at a
rollicking angle, a shining tin helmet.  The costume was
to be instantly recognized as one of those amazing con-
ceptions to which competition has harried the inventors
of the spectacular ballet.  One of the officers bore a long
cloak upon his axm, which, doubtless, had been intended
to veil the I candid attractions of their effulgent prisoner,
but, for some reason, it had not been called into use, to
the vociferous delight of the tail of the procession.

Compelled by a sudden and vigorous movement of the
woman, the parade halted before the window by which
Lorison stood.  He saw that she was young, and, at the
first glance, was deceived by a sophistical prettiness of her
face, which waned before a more judicious scrutiny.
Her look was bold and reckless, and upon her countenance,
where yet the contours of youth survived, were the finger-
marks of old age's credentialed courier, Late Hours.

The young woman fixed her unshrinking gaze upon
Lorison, and called to him in the voice of the wronged
heroine in straits:

"Say!  You look like a good fellow; come and put up
the bail, won't you?  I've done nothing to get pinched
for.  It's all a mistake.  See how they're treating me!
You won't be sorry, if you'll help me out of this.  Think
of your sister or your girl being dragged along the streets
this way!  I say, come along now, like a good fellow."

It may be that Lorison, in spite of the unconvincing
bathos of this appeal, showed a sympathetic face, for one
of the officers left the woman's side, and went over to
him.

"It's all right, Sir," he said, in a husky, confidential
tone; "she's the right party.  We took her after the first
act at the Green Light Theatre, on a wire from the chief
of police of Chicago.  It's only a square or two to the
station.  Her rig's pretty bad, but she refused to change
clothes -- or, rather," added the officer, with a smile,
"to put on some.  I thought I'd explain matters to
you so you wouldn't think she was being imposed
upon."

"What is the charge?"  asked Lorison.

"Grand larceny.  Diamonds.  Her husband is a
jeweller in Chicago.  She cleaned his show case of the
sparklers, and skipped with a comic-opera troupe."

The policeman, perceiving that the interest of the entire
group of spectators was centred upon himself and Lorison
-- their conference being regarded as a possible new com-
plication -- was fain to prolong the situation -- which
reflected his own importance -- by a little afterpiece of
philosophical comment.

"A gentleman like you, Sir," he went on affably,
"would never notice it, but it comes in my line to observe
what an immense amount of trouble is made by that com-
bination -- I mean the stage, diamonds and light-headed
women who aren't satisfied with good homes.  I tell
you, Sir, a man these days and nights wants to know what
his women folks are up to."

The policeman smiled a good night, and returned to
the side of his charge, who had been intently watching
Lorison's face during the conversation, no doubt for
some indication of his intention to render succour.  Now,
at the failure of the sign, and at the movement made to
continue the ignominious progress, she abandoned hope,
and addressed him thus, pointedly:

"You damn chalk-faced quitter!  You was thinking
of giving me a hand, but you let the cop talk you out of
it the first word.  You're a dandy to tie to.  Say, if you
ever get a girl, she'll have a picnic.  Won't she work
you to the queen's taste!  Oh, my!"  She concluded
with a taunting, shrill laugh that rasped Lorison like a
saw.  The policemen urged her forward; the delighted
train of gaping followers closed up the rear; and the
captive Amazon, accepting her fate, extended the scope
of her maledictions so that none in hearing might seem
to be slighted.

Then there came upon Lorison an overwhelming
revulsion of his perspective.  It may be that he had
been ripe for it, that the abnormal condition of mind in
which he had for so long existed was already about to
revert to its balance; however, it is certain that the events
of the last few minutes had furnished the channel, if not
the impetus, for the change.

The initial determining influence had been so small
a thing as the fact and manner of his having been
approached by the officer.  That agent had, by the style
of his accost, restored the loiterer to his former place in
society.  In an instant he had been transformed from
a somewhat rancid prowler along the fishy side streets of
gentility into an honest gentleman, with whom even so
lordly a guardian of the peace might agreeably exchange
the compliments.

This, then, first broke the spell, and set thrilling in him
a resurrected longing for the fellowship of his kind, and
the rewards of the virtuous.  To what end, he vehemently
asked himself, was this fanciful self-accusation, this
empty renunciation, this moral squeamishness through
which he had been led to abandon what was his heritage
in life, and not beyond his deserts?  Technically, he was
uncondemned; his sole guilty spot was in thought rather
than deed, and cognizance of it unshared by others.  For
what good, moral or sentimental, did he slink, retreating
like the hedgehog from his own shadow, to and fro in this
musty Bohemia that lacked even the picturesque?

But the thing that struck home and set him raging was
the part played by the Amazonian prisoner.  To the
counterpart of that astounding belligerent -- identical
at least, in the way of experience -- to one, by her own
confession, thus far fallen, had he, not three hours since,
been united in marriage.  How desirable and natural it
had seemed to him then, and how monstrous it seemed
now!  How the words of diamond thief number two yet
burned in his ears: "If you ever get a cirl, she'll have a
picnic.  What did that that this women instinc-
tively knew him for one they could hoodwink?  Still again,
there reverberated the policeman's sapient contribution
to his agony: "A man these days and nights wants to
know what his women folks are up to."  Oh, yes, he had
been a fool; he had looked at things from the wrong
standpoint.

But the wildest note in all the clamour was struck by
pain's forefinger, jealousy.  Now, at least, he felt that
keenest sting -- a mounting love unworthily bestowed.
Whatever she might be, he loved her; he bore in his own
breast his doom.  A grating, comic flavour to his pre-
dicament struck him suddenly, and he laughed creakingly
as he swung down the echoing pavement.  An impetuous
desire to act, to battle with his fate, seized him.  He
stopped upon his heel, and smote his palms together
triumphantly.  His wife was -- where?  But there was
a tangible link; an outlet more or less navigable, through
which his derelict ship of matrimony might yet be safely
towed -- the priest!

Like all imaginative men with pliable natures, Lorison
was, when thoroughly stirred, apt to become tempest-
uous.  With a high and stubborn indignation upon him,
be retraced his steps to the intersecting street by which
he had come.  Down this he hurried to the corner where
he had parted with -- an astringent grimace tinctured the
thought -- his wife.  Thence still back he harked, follow-
ing through an unfamiliar district his stimulated recollec-
tions of the way they had come from that preposterous
wedding.  Many times he went abroad, and nosed his
way back to, the trail, furious.

At last, when he reached the dark, calamitous building
in which his madness had culminated, and found the
black hallway, he dashed down it, perceiving no light
or sound.  But he raised his voice, hailing loudly; reckless
of everything but that he should find the old mischief-
maker with the eyes that looked too far awav to see the
disaster he had wrought.  The door opened, and in the
stream of light Father Rogan stood, his book in hand,
with his finger marking the place.

"Ah!"  cried Lorison.  "You are the man I want.  I
had a wife of you a few hours ago.  I would not trouble
you, but I neglected to note how it was done.  Will you
oblige me with the information whether the business is
beyond remedy?"

"Come inside," said the priest;  "there are other lodgers
in the house, who might prefer sleep to even a gratified
curiosity."

Lorison entered the room and took the chair offered
him.  The priest's eyes looked a courteous interrogation.

"I must apologize again," said the young man, "for so
soon intruding upon you with my marital infelicities,
but, as my wife has neglected to furnish me with her
address, I am deprived of the legitimate recourse of a
family row."

"I am quite a plain man," said Father Rogan, pleas-
antly; "but I do not see how I am to ask you questions."

"Pardon my indirectness," said Lorison; "I will ask
one.  In this room to-night you pronounced me to be a
husband.  You afterward spoke of additional rites or
performances that either should or could be effected.  I
paid little attention to your words then, but I am hungry
to hear them repeated now.  As matters stand, am I
married past all help?"

"You are as legally and as firmly bound," said the
priest, "as though it had been done in a cathedral, in the
presence of thousands.  The additional observances I
referred to are not necessary to the strictest legality of the
act, but were advised as a precaution for the future --
for convenience of proof in such contingencies as wills,
inheritances and the like."

Lorison laughed harshly.

"Many thanks," he said.  "Then there is no mistake,
and I am the happy benedict.  I suppose I should go
stand upon the bridal corner, and when my wife gets
through walking the streets she will look me up."

Father Rogan regarded him calmly.

"My son," he said, "when a man and woman come to
me to be married I always marry them.  I do this for the
sake of other people whom they might go away and marry
if they did not marry each other.  As you see, I do not
seek your confidence; but your case seems to me to be
one not altogether devoid of interest.  Very few marriages
that have come to my notice have brought such well-
expressed regret within so short a time.  I will hazard
one question: were you not under the impression
that you loved the lady you married, at the time you
did so;"

"Loved her!"  cried Lorison, wildly.  "Never so well
as now, though she told me she deceived and sinned and
stole.  Never more than now, when, perhaps, she is
laughing at the fool she cajoled and left, with scarcely a
word, to return to God only knows what particular line
of her former folly."

Father Rooan answered nothing.  During the silence
that succeeded, he sat with a quiet expectation beaming
in his full, lambent eye.

"If you would listen -- " began Lorison.  The
priest held up his hand.

"As I hoped," he said.  "I thought you would trust
me.  Wait but a moment."  He brought a long clay
pipe, filled and lighted it.

"Now, my son," he said.

Lorison poured a twelve month's accumulated con-
fidence into Father Rogan's ear.  He told all; not sparing
himself or omitting the facts of his past, the events of the
night, or his disturbing conjectures and fears.

"The main point," said the priest, when he had con-
cluded, "seems to me to be this -- are you reasonably
sure that you love this woman whom you have married?"

"Why," exclaimed Lorisoii, rising impulsively to his
feet - "why should I deny it?  But look at me -- am
fish, flesh or fowl?  That is the main point to me,
assure you."

"I understand you," said the priest, also risino,, and
laying down his pipe.  "The situation is one that has
taxed the endurance of much older men than you -- in
fact, especially much older men than you.  I will try to
relieve you from it, and this night.  You shall see for
yourself into exactly what predicament you have fallen,
and how you shall, possibly, be extricated.  There is no
evidence so credible as that of the eyesight."

Father Rogan moved about the room, and donned a
soft black hat.  Buttoning his coat to his throat, he
laid his hand on the doorknob.  "Let us walk,"
he said.

The two went out upon the street.  The priest turned
his face down it, and Lorison walked with him through a
squalid district, where the houses loomed, awry and
desoiate-looking, high above them.  Presently they turned
into a less dismal side street, where the houses were smaller,
and, though hinting of the most meagre comfort, lacked
the concentrated wretchedness of the more populous
byways.

At a segregated, two-story house Father Rogan halted,
and mounted the steps with the confidence of a familiar
visitor.  He ushered Lorison into a narrow hallway,
faintly lighted by a cobwebbed hanging lamp.  Almost
immediately a door to the right opened and a dingy Irish-
woman protruded her head.

"Good evening to ye, Mistress Geehan," said the
priest, unconsciously, it seemed, falling into a delicately
flavoured brogue.  "And is it yourself can tell me if
Norah has gone out again, the night, maybe?"

"Oh, it's yer blissid reverence!  Sure and I can tell
ye the same.  The purty darlin' wint out, as usual, but a
bit later.  And she says: 'Mother Geehan,' says she, 'it's
me last noight out, praise the saints, this noight is!' And,
oh, yer reverence, the swate, beautiful drame of a dress she
had this toime!  White satin and silk and ribbons, and
lace about the neck and arrums -- 'twas a sin, yer
reverence, the gold was spint upon it."

The priest heard Lorison catch his breath painfully,
and a faint smile flickered across his own clean-cut
mouth.

"Well, then, Mistress Geehan," said he, "I'll just
step upstairs and see the bit boy for a minute, and I'll
take this Gentleman up with me."

"He's awake, thin," said the woman.  'I've just
come down from sitting wid him the last hour, tilling him
fine shtories of ould County Tyrone.  'Tis a greedy gos-
soon, it is, yer riverence, for me shtories."

"Small the doubt," said Father Rogan.  "There's no
rocking would put him to slape the quicker, I'm thinking."

Amid the woman's shrill protest against the retort, the
two men ascended the steep stairway.  The priest pushed
open the door of a room near its top.

"Is that you already, sister?"  drawled a sweet, childish
voice from the darkness.

"It's only ould Father Denny come to see ye, darlin';
and a foine gentleman I've brought to make ye a gr-r-and
call.  And ye resaves us fast aslape in bed!  Shame on
yez manners!"

"Oh, Father Denny, is that you?  I'm glad.  And
will you light the lamp, please?  It's on the table by the
door.  And quit talking like Mother Geehan, Father
Denny."

The priest lit the lamp, and Lorison saw a tiny, towsled-
haired boy, with a thin, delicate face, sitting up in a small
bed in a corner.  Quickly, also, his rapid glance con-
sidered the room and its contents.  It was furnished with
more than comfort, and its adornments plainly indicated
a woman's discerning taste.  An open door beyond
revealed the blackness of an adjoining room's interior.

The boy clutched both of Father Rogan's hands.  "I'm
so glad you came," he said; "but why did you come in
the night?  Did sister send you?"

"Off wid ye!  Am I to be sint about, at me age, as
was Terence McShane, of Ballymahone?  I come on me
own r-r-responsibility."

Lorison had also advanced to the boy's bedside.  He
was fond of children; and the wee fellow, laving himself
down to sleep alone ill that dark room, stirred-his heart.

"Aren't you afraid, little man?"  he asked, stooping
down beside him.

"Sometimes," answered the boy, with a shy smile,
"when the rats make too much noise.  But nearly every
night, when sister goes out, Molt-her Geehan stays a while
with me, and tells me funny stories.  I'm not often
afraid, sir."

"This brave little gentleman," said Father Rogan, "is
a scholar of mine.  Every day from half-past six to half-
past eight -- when sister comes for him -- he stops in
my study, and we find out what's in the inside of books.
He knows multiplication, division and fractions; and
he's troubling me to begin wid the chronicles of Ciaran
of Clonmaciioise, Corurac McCullenan and Cuan O'Loc-
hain, the gr-r-reat Irish histhorians."  The boy was
evidently accustomed to the priest's Celtic pleasantries.
A little, appreciative grin was all the attention the insin-
nation of pedantry received.

Lorison, to have saved his life, could not have put to
the child one of those vital questions that were wildly
beating about, unanswered, in his own brain.  The little
fellow was very like Norah; he had the same shining
hair and candid eyes.

"Oh, Father Denny," cried the boy, suddenly, "I
forgot to tell you!  Sister is not going away at night any
more!  She told me so when she kissed me good night as
she was leaving.  And she said she was so happy, and
then she cried.  Wasn't that queer?  But I'm glad;
aren't you?"

"Yes, lad.  And now, ye omadhaun, go to sleep, and
say good night; we must be going."

"Which shall I do first, Father Denny?"

"Faith, he's caught me again!  Wait till I get the
sassenach into the annals of Tageruach, the hagiographer;
I'll give him enough of the Irish idiom to make him more
respectful."

The light was out, and the small, brave voice bidding
them good night from the dark room.  They groped
downstairs, and tore away from the garrulity of Mother
Geehan.

Again the priest steered them through the dim ways,
but this time in another direction.  His conductor was
serenely silent, and Lorison followed his example to the
extent of seldom speaking.  Serene he could not be.  His
heart beat suffocatingly in his breast.  The following of
this blind, menacing trail was pregnant with he knew not
what humiliating revelation to be delivered at its end.

They came into a more pretentious street, where trade,
it could be surmised, flourished by day.  And again the
priest paused; this time before a lofty building, whose
great doors and windows in the lowest floor were carefully
shuttered and barred.  Its higher apertures were dark,
save in the third story, the windows of which were bril-
liantly lighted.  Lorison's ear caught a distant, regular,
pleasing thrumming, as of music above.  They stood at
an angle of the building.  Up, along the side nearest them,
mounted an iron stairway.  At its top was an upright,
illuminated parallelogram.  Father Rogan had stopped,
and stood, musing.

"I will say this much," he remarked, thoughtfully:
"I believe you to be a better man than you think yourself
to be, and a better man than I thought some hours ago.
But do not take this," he added, with a smile, "as much
praise.  I promised you a possible deliverance from an
unhappy perplexity.  I will have to modify that promise.
I can only remove the mystery that enhanced that per-
plexity.  Your deliverance depends upon yourself.
Come."

He led his companion up the stairway.  Halfway up,
Lorison caught him by the sleeve.  "Remember," he
gasped, "I love that woman."

"You desired to know.

"I -- Go on."

The priest reached the landing at the top of the stairway.
Lorison, behind him, saw that the illuminated space was
the glass upper half of a door opening into the lighted
room.  The rhythmic music increased as they neared
it; the stairs shook with the mellow vibrations.

Lorison stopped breathing when he set foot upon the
highest step, for the priest stood aside, and motioned him
to look through the glass of the door.

His eye, accustomed to the darkness, met first a blind-
ing glare, and then he made out the faces and forms of
many people, amid an extravagant display of splendid
robings -- billowy laces, brilliant-hued finery, ribbons,
silks and misty drapery.  And then he caught the mean.
ing of that jarring hum, and he saw the tired, pale, happy
face of his wife, bending, as were a score of others, over
her sewing machine -- toiling, toiling.  Here was the
folly she pursued, and the end of his quest.

But not his deliverance, though even then remorse
struck him.  His shamed soul fluttered once more before
it retired to make room for the other and better one.
For, to temper his thrill of joy, the shine of the satin and
the glimmer of ornaments recalled the disturbing figure
of the bespangled Amazon, and the base duplicate histories
it by the glare of footlights and stolen diamonds.  It is
past the wisdom of him who only sets the scenes, either to
praise or blame the man.  But this time his love over-
came his scruples.  He took a quick step, and reached
out his hand for the doorknob.  Father Rogan was
quicker to arrest it and draw him back.

"You use my trust in you queerly," said the priest
sternly.  "What are you about to do?"

"I am going to my wife," said Lorison.  "Let me pass."

"Listen," said the priest, holding him firmly by the
arm.  "I am about to put you in possession of a piece of
knowledge of which, thus far, you have scarcely proved
deserving.  I do not think you ever will; but I will not
dwell upon that.  You see in that room the woman you
married, working for a frugal living for herself, and a
generous comfort for an idolized brother.  This building
belongs to the chief costumer of the city.  For months the
advance orders for the coming Mardi Gras festivals have
kept the work going day and night.  I myself secured
employment here for Norah.  She toils here each night
from nine o'clock until daylight, and, besides, carries
home with her some of the finer costumes, requiring more
delicate needlework, and works there part of the day.
Somehow, you two have remained strangely ignorant of
each other's lives.  Are you convinced now that your
wife is not walking the streets?"

"Let me go to her," cried Lorison, again struggling,
"and beg her forgiveness!'

"Sir," said the priest, "do you owe me nothing?  Be
quiet.  It seems so often that Heaven lets fall its choicest
gifts into hands that must be taught to hold them.  Listen
again.  You forgot that repentant sin must not comprom-
ise, but look up, for redemption, to the purest and best.
You went to her with the fine-spun sophistry that peace
could be found in a mutual guilt; and she, fearful of losing
what her heart so craved, thought it worth the price to
buy it with a desperate, pure, beautiful lie.  I have known
her since the day she was born; she is as innocent and
unsullied in life and deed as a holy saint.  In that lowly
street where she dwells she first saw the light, and she
has lived there ever since, spending her days in generous
self-sacrifice for others.  Och, ye spalpeen!"  continued
Father Rogan, raising his finger in kindly anger at Lorison.
"What for, I wonder, could she be after making a fool
of hersilf, and shamin' her swate soul with lies, for the
like of you!"

"Sir," said Lorison, trembling, "say what you please
of me.  Doubt it as you must, I will yet prove my gratitude
to you, and my devotion to her.  But let me speak to her
once now, let me kneel for just one moment at her feet,
and -- "

"Tut, tut!"  said the priest.  "How many acts of a
love drama do you think an old bookworm like me capable
of witnessing?  Besides, what kind of figures do we cut,
spying upon the mysteries of midnight millinery!  Go
to meet your wife to-morrow, as she ordered you, and obey
her thereafter, and maybe some time I shall get forgive-
ness for the part I have played in this night's work.  Off
wid yez down the shtairs, now!  'Tis late, and an ould
man like me should be takin' his rest."